Australia's oldest Olympian Basil Dickinson dies

Basil Dickinson, who was Australia's oldest surviving Olympian, has died at the age of 98.

Dickinson, a track and field athlete from the 1936 Berlin Games, was born in Queanbeyan on April 25, 1915, and died at his home in the Blue Mountains on Monday.

He was one of 33 Australians competing in Berlin. Dickinson competed in the triple jump alongside team-mate Jack Metcalfe who had broken the triple jump world record in 1935 with Dickinson also close to the world mark that year.

Metcalfe collected the bronze medal while Dickinson finished 16th.

Many of the Australian team had to save 200 pounds to actually make the 41-day trip to Berlin by boat, in order to compete in the Olympics which went down in history as "Hitler's Games".

Dickinson's biographer, Larry Writer, says the Australian team were the first to arrive in the Olympic village.

"Hitler actually came down with some Hitler Youth and did their address, welcomed them to Berlin," he said.